


Gentle is Your Hand

by JyaGhost



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-20
Updated: 2016-02-20
Packaged: 2018-05-22 05:55:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6067681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JyaGhost/pseuds/JyaGhost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sequel to "The Man in Black." Rodney's escort keeps his promise.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gentle is Your Hand

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Shadow Lover" by Mercedes Lackey.

~~~~

"Hey Rodney."

The same gorgeous eyes; the same lean, almost scrawny body. It had been a year, and he hadn't changed one bit.

"John." Rodney said calmly, stepping aside to let the other man pass. "Do I still call you John?"

"Yeah, that works." John smiled slightly, looked around the empty apartment. “Wow. You uh, kinda give new meaning to the word Spartan.”

“I told everyone I was redecorating.” Rodney shrugged. “Sold it all off, put it in the bank for my niece.”

"Didn't you say you had a cat?" There was a puzzled frown on John's lips now.

"Yeah. I gave Doggie away." Rodney answered, clearing his throat slightly and shutting the door. "As soon as the paramedics show up, that hag downstairs would be calling Animal Control. I rescued him from there, he's not going back."

John blanched slightly at the word 'paramedics' and looked around again, saying nothing.

Rodney walked past him to the only piece of furniture left in the place; an old, battered couch, and settled on it comfortably. "I'm ready."

"You're...?" John blinked, genuinely startled.

"I'm ready." Rodney reaffirmed.

"It doesn't have to happen now," John reached up to rub his neck. "We could go get something to eat..."

"I did that already. The last meal and all that. So...I'm sure you've got other people waiting for you, probably in hideous pain, so...just..get on with it."

"We don't have to do it here. Is there someplace...?"

"My life revolved around the lab and here," Rodney cleared his throat, the slightest hint of nerves showing through. "It's...not fair to Sam and the others...finding me there. I…uh...I've got a friend…well, friend of a friend...he's coming over tomorrow. Has a key. He was a soldier...he can deal with...everything. Really. So…it's better here."

Completely thrown off balance, John stared for a long time, Rodney growing increasingly agitated as the minutes passed.

Finally, Rodney looked up, meeting John's eyes. "Look, you...you gave me a year. One that I wasn't supposed to have." He cleared his throat nervously. "I...I didn't waste it. I stopped my research someplace somebody can pick it up fairly easily; I made peace with Jeannie, met Madison. I got a chance to save Doggie again. I...thank you."

John remained quiet, face inscrutable.

Rodney's nerves increased, and he started to babble a little with them. "Why did you do it? I've been wondering. I mean...well, I was pissed because I thought you made me sick in the first place, but then I remembered how everyone was surprised I was still alive...that I didn't have any symptoms from the tumor at all. Except I did. Have symptoms I mean. Before I ever met you. I thought it was stress, you know? Or the air in the labs. I just...I never bothered to have them checked out. Me. The big hypochondriac...dying of brain cancer and not even knowing it."

"Did you get into trouble?" Rodney asked, in the face of John's complete silence. "For not ...taking me at the hotel? For taking that other guy? Girl? Person."

“I didn’t trade that woman’s life for yours.” John said softly. "It doesn't work like that."

"Oh."

John walked carefully over to the couch and sat down by Rodney, who turned to face him fully. "Obviously, I've never done this before. What happens?"

"It's different each time," John reached out, stroked a hand over Rodney's cheek. "It 's not going to hurt though. I promise."

Rodney closed his eyes, visibly swallowed down his fear. "You didn't answer my question."

"Ask me again." John urged.

"Why did you...delay things?"

"Dinner."

Rodney waited for an explanation, but none came. "Dinner? What's that got to do with anything?"

"When you called, you mentioned ordering dinner. You didn't want the guy you were hiring for sex to go hungry."

Blue eyes showed utter confusion. John leaned forward, looking at his hands. "It...look, we...try to make the last day...pleasant. You wanted a man. I." John shrugged. "I like sex. It's fun. I could give you a good time, and." He rubbed his neck again, looking up at Rodney. "That would be that. But you mentioned twice to charge my food to your order. Most people that...well, hire escorts...don't exactly care. And then you rewound Batman so I could watch it with you. You didn't just...jump me."

"You're not really a hooker, sorry, escort though."

"No. But I've played the part more than a few times."

"Oh." Rodney didn't know what to say to that, so he didn't say anything at all.

John reached out, gently stroking Rodney's cheek and behind his ear. Rodney leaned into the touch and sighed. "Is it starting?" He asked, feeling tired.

"Yes."

"You're going to stay with me?" The question was plaintive.

"All the way." John confirmed.

"I don't suppose we could have sex again? Not that I'm trying to stall or anything, but the last time was really good."

"I can hold you, if you want." Already, John was shifting to take Rodney into his arms.

Rodney snuggled into the embrace, putting his nose against John's chest and inhaling the other man's unique scent. A full year had passed, but he'd never forgotten it.

"Does your heart really beat, or are you just making noises so I won't freak out?"

"It really beats." John caressed Rodney's back, massaged his neck and skull.

“I wanted to ask a bunch of questions, but I can’t remember them now.” Rodney sighed again, his fear gone. Peace was taking it's place. "I almost wish you'd come sooner," he murmured sleepily. "So I could stay here a little longer, being held. I liked that, the last time. It was really nice. I never had a lover that stayed over before. Wham, bam, thanks Rodney bye. I always slept alone till you. That‘s sad, isn‘t it?” He wanted to raise his head up, to look into John’s pretty eyes again, but it was too much effort, and really, he was so comfortable where he was. “Will I get to see you?”

Rodney cuddled a little more into the warmth of John’s body, and never heard the answer.

****

“Hey Rodney.”

Sam Carter never knew why she came here. It wasn’t like he was actually down there.

But she wound up on this bench at least once a month, a cup of coffee in one hand and something food related in the other. She had her husband to blame for those; it was some strange tradition of his that had seemed oddly perfect for Rodney, considering McKay was allergic to just about anything with a blossom.

She crumbled the blueberry muffin she’d brought today, legacy of an uneaten breakfast, and scattered the bits into the grass. Crouching, she slowly poured half the coffee along the edges of the memorial stone before re-taking her seat and sipping the rest.

Pigeons came down in droves, pecking at the crumbs as Sam regaled Rodney with the general incompetence of the new hires, briskly moving on to workplace gossip and the state of the world.

As the sun went down and the birds left for their roosts, she ran out of words. Just sat quietly with her thoughts.

She’d never thought she’d miss that arrogant bastard, and yet here she was. Again.

She knew what set her off though. Today marked five years since the courts determined that one Dr. Meredith Rodney McKay, brilliant astrophysicist, was most likely dead. Thirteen years since he’d vanished into thin air from an apartment that had been stripped clean except for a couch.

Sam had been the one to call Jeannie Miller and ask the first questions that sent everyone into a tailspin. “Have you heard from your brother?” and “Do you know where he could be?”

Seventy-two hours after that, it had been Sam and Radek who filed the missing person’s report that was the beginning of the end.

After three months, trying to lure Rodney out of hiding, Radek got Jeannie’s permission to publish a few of Rodney’s articles in the best scientific journals around. Out of orneriness, he’d also contacted a pair of tabloids and claimed Rodney ran off after getting several women pregnant.

Nothing. 

Two months later, the courts got their heads out of their collective asses and gave Rodney’s personal physician a subpoena for Rodney’s medical records.

The diagnosis brought everyone to their knees. Rodney had refused the treatments that might have saved him. He’d taken the prescriptions that would keep him mostly functional until the end and walked out.

Laws were laws, and Jeannie couldn’t legally have Rodney declared deceased until seven years had passed. The doctors had given him less than one to live without medical assistance.

Eighteen months after Rodney disappeared, despite the law, Jeannie gathered her brother’s colleagues together and marked what would be his grave with a tombstone and prayers. When the formal paperwork was finally completed, she and her husband had come to the site from the courthouse. Along with Sam and Radek, they’d burned a copy of the ‘death certificate‘ and a small photo of Rodney, laying both him and their lingering hopes to rest.

Sighing heavily, Sam got up. In the distance, she could see streetlights coming on, signaling that it was time to go home.

“See you around McKay.” Just like always, she saluted the grave, slammed back the last of her coffee like a vodka shot and left.

And just like she always, she missed the voice in the wind saying: “See you around Sam.” 

End.


End file.
